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Proclamation

by

His Excellency
The Honourable Robert Gabriel Mugabe, Grand Commander of the Zimbabwe
Order of Merit, President of Zimbabwe and Commander-in-Chief of
the Defence Forces of Zimbabwe.

WHEREAS, it
is provided by section 3 of the Referendums Act [Chapter 2:10] that,
whenever the President considers it desirable to ascertain the views
of voters on any question or issue, he may by proclamation in the
Gazette— ­­

(a) declare
that a referendum is to be held in order to ascertain the view of
voters on that question or issue; and

(b) appoint
a day or days for the holding of the referendum; and

(c) state the
hours at which voting for the purposes of the referendum will commence
and will close;

AND WHEREAS,
by Article VI of the Global Zimbabwe Agreement (the provisions of
which are embodied as the “Interparty Zimbabwe Agreement”
in Schedule 8 to the Constitution
of Zimbabwe), the Committee on Standing Rules and Orders of Parliament
appointed the Constitution Parliamentary Select Committee on the
drafting
of a new constitution for Zimbabwe (referred to as “COPAC”)
on the 12th April, 2009, which consisted of certain Zimbabwe of
Parliament from the political parties that participated in the Global
Zimbabwe Agreement and a representative of the Council of Chiefs
who sits in Parliament:

AND WHEREAS
COPAC duly prepared a draft Constitution for Zimbabwe, under cover
of a report that was tabled before Parliament on the 6th and 7th
February, 2013, and adopted by Parliament;

AND WHEREAS
I consider it desirable to ascertain the view of voters on whether
or not the said draft Constitution, should be enacted as the Constitution
of Zimbabwe;

AND WHEREAS
it is the function of the Zimbabwe Electoral Commission to conduct
referendums in terms of section 100C of the Constitution of Zimbabwe:

NOW, THEREFORE,
under and by virtue of the powers vested in the President as aforesaid,
I do, by this my proclamation—

(a) declare
that a referendum is to be held in order to ascertain the view of
voters on whether or not the draft
Constitution which is published in a Gazette Extraordinary together
with this Proclamation should be adopted as the Constitution of
Zimbabwe;

(b) appoint
Saturday, the 16th March, 2013, as the day on which the referendum
will be held; and

(c) state that,
on the day on which the referendum is held, voting at polling stations
will commence at seven o’clock in the morning and close at
seven o’clock in the evening.

Given under
my hand and the Public Seal of Zimbabwe at Harare, this fourteenth
day of February, in the year of Our Lord two thousand and thirteen.